After Reading About The Faked Reference, Acc Launched An Investigation

Fake reference led to the discovery of nearly $40k fraud
Last updated 14:06, January 27 2017

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Convicted fraudster Jenna Davidson was back before the court for defrauding another employer

As she was being sentenced for defrauding Wellington Airport, Jenna Davidson offered a glowing reference from her new boss. When the new boss at ACC read about it on Stuff, he realised she was also ripping them off.

Davidson, 31, had been sentenced to six months community detention and 120 hours community work for misusing $40,000 on the company credit card while she was the executive assistant to the Wellington Airport CEO.

Meanwhile, she had been hired as as executive assistant to the Chief Talent officer for ACC.

As part of her submissions to the sentencing judge for the airport fraud she had supplied a character reference purporting to be her supervisor at her new job at ACC. She got that job in December 2015.

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Davidson had used her work computer to write the reference and signed the statement above his name.

When she was sentenced on a charge of theft in a special relationship, the judge commented on the reference that it was "glowing about [the defendant] and [her] character."

Her new boss found out she had forged his name only after seeing that a "glowing reference" had been supplied to the court while reading an article on Stuff.

When Davidson was asked about the reference she said she created the document with the intention to using it to have a positive effect in relation to her sentence.

After reading about the faked reference, ACC launched an investigation.

They discovered that between February 2016 and June 2016 she used a BNZ Visa purchasing card 181 times and at 43 different retailers for a total of $39,732.50.

A lot of the purchases were for groceries, bills, clothing, footwear and homewares.

The offending took place online, at weekends, when she was on annual leave and on sick leave.

Among the items she bought were an iPad, men's and women's clothing, perfume, petrol, Sky TV, a video game and dental services.

Transactions were recorded to show ACC the spending was on room hire, gift vouchers, flowers and stationary.

Police recovered only $2000 of clothing, electronics, footwear and housewares. They have asked for a order to destroy the recovered property.

When interviewed by police she said she had made a mistake that stemmed from personal hardship, an abusive relationship and financial difficulties.